Tailgating the Popemobile

This past weekend I spent some time working on my trusty VW van. It has an issue with the turn signal. The right one works fine, but the left signal is pretty spastic. It either blinks as fast as a strobe light, or not at all.

One solution, of course, would be to stop making left turns. It would be quite tricky, though, to get where one wants to go by only making right turns. Even if you do arrive at your destination through a series of right turns, you would be forced to stay there forever, as your journey home would be all left turns. Better to fix the turn signal.

Doing this repair made me wonder, What if we had turn signals ahead of us on the road of our lives? What if there was a vehicle we could follow that knew the way our lives should go and would lead us accordingly?

The best vehicle for this job would have to be the Popemobile. First of all, it’s a sweet ride. More importantly, however, it’s driven by the Pope, or at least he tells the driver where to go, probably with a cool walkie talkie: “Pope to driver, turn in here at the McDonald’s drive-thru. I feel like a Big Mac and a Dr. Poper.”

I mean, if our lives were a car on a road, why not follow behind the wisest, most in-touch-with-God guy on the planet? All you’d need to do is get a walkie talkie with enough batteries to last a lifetime, then learn Latin, and you’d be set to go.

As you traveled your life road, the Pope would give you his wisest advice on all your life decisions. He would say things like, “We’re turning left ahead so that you can take this particular job,” or “Bear to the right here so you can go to this school and earn your degree,” or “Marry that woman standing by the side of the road.”

What do you think? If you had the option to be guided to all the right decisions in your life, would you do it? Or would you put your foot on the accelerator, pass the Popemobile, and say on your walkie talkie, “Thanks, Pope Francis, but I’ll make my own life decisions. I’ll never know for sure the right way to turn. I’ll certainly make mistakes. But right or wrong they’ll be my own free decisions.”

Thank you very much for reading. I wish you a wonderful trip down the road of life.